The Liturgy: March 2004 Archives

I was ordained in 1991. At that time a new sacramentary was on the horizon. I am in my 13th year of priesthood. The more I have studied the latin I know how poorly we have been served by our current sacramentary. Most egregious has been the prefaces, especially the seasonal ones. Some of the images of these prayers have made it into homilies, but sadly have not been supported by the text of the mass.

Not everyone will be happy with the new book, but I am sure that in many ways it will be a vast improvement. Maybe it will encourage more priests to pray the mass rather than preach it.

Deliver us, Lord, we pray, from every evil,
graciously grant peace in our days,
that with the help of your mercy
we may be always free from sin
and safe from all disquiet
as we await the blessed hope
and the coming of our Savior Jesus Christ.

I am not sure that "disquiet" is a word we use in common English, and it happens in a place where many priests have been tempted to change or explain the "anxiety" that we are trying to avoid. One hope I have is that there will be less temptation to over-psychologize the Mass.

It has been more than four years since the GIRM was released. It is about time we had a new book to use for prayer for the next generation. I am getting tired of waiting. Lent is one of those times where this wait becomes painful. I have Fr. Marvin Steffes' translations of the Lenten Prefaces. The differences are incredible and the images from the Latin prefaces and prayers are so much more inspirational and instructive.

God, help our Bishops to make a decision quickly and to get these prayers into our hands as soon as possible.